Oriental Institute of Management,

Mumbai 5th April 2012

Professor M. M. Sharma, FRS

Emeritus Professor of EminenceInstitute of Chemical Technology

(Deemed University), Mumbai

Role of Creativity and Innovation

Professor M. M. Sharma

Invention refers to any new idea that works

Innovation refers to ideas which are converted to

profitable use

Innovation is basically the oxygen for your future

To lead industry you have to innovate properly

Approach innovation in an innovative way

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Everything we know will become blunt over time

Innovation is not a functional activity; it is a business

activity and you need every component of business-

sales, marketing, manufacturing- as a piece of it

Innovation cannot be scheduled

Research is subjective, inspirational and often

irrational; it is not a very structured activity; it can be

described as a random walk in a blind valley to find

whether it is really blind

Results of Research are seldom known in advance3MMS -OIM Mumbai

Innovation is tough to manage and easy to stifle

Innovator is often harassed!

While management demands Consensus, Control,

Certainty, and the Status quo, Creativity thrives on the

opposite – Instinct, Uncertainty, Freedom and

Iconoclasm.

Management and creativity are antithetical

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Technology is the systematic orchestration of all

knowledge and experience to lead to something

practical and commercially useful

Technology should be demarcated from scientific

pursuits which are concerned with creating new

knowledge and opening new frontiers and, in its own

right, is also cultural activity.

Robert Solov, N.L., 1987,- at least 50% of economic

growth can be attributed to technology development

(In advanced countries it could be 70 to 80%)5MMS -OIM Mumbai

Technology is big “C” of capital and is an expensive

equity and ability to make advances become sharper

Technology is a crucial instrument, even a weapon, to

compete internationally in a truly free market

Technology Development should be like a rowing

exercise and not a relay race

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Technology can create an altogether new trajectory for

economic revolution

Technology is nutrition

Quantum jump take place through discontinuities and

not through linear path (e.g. transistors, lasers, NMR,

vaccines, etc.)

Growth is based on Discovery as well as Market

Driven approaches (archetype polyamide- Nylons)

How to find the needle in the Haystack and how to find

it fast?7MMS -OIM Mumbai

Both international and national empirical evidence have recognized the role of Technology progress in economic growth through increase in Total Factor Productivity (TFP)

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NAS / NAC – USA

Rebuilding a Real Economy: UnleashingEngineering Innovation

The financial crisis that began in 2008 is a starkDemonstration that we as a nation have put ourcountry at risk by allowing too much of our economyto be based on sectors that do not create real value.

Relying on vaporous transactions to generate wealth isno substitute for making real products and providingreal services

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• In the 21st century, the United States and the rest of the world will face some of the most serious challenges of the modem age; feeding a growing population, generating adequate energy without destroying the environment, countering chronic and emerging infectious diseases

• The first decade of the new century has shown that engineering and technological innovation will be essential for the United States and other countries to meet these challenges

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• Entrepreneurs are generally innovators and developers in the economy. They are creative and are driven by animal spirit of making profit. They are also risk takers. These entrepreneurs facilitate “learning by doing” in embodied and disembodied technical progress

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• Innovation requires an open mind and an atmosphere that encourages people to imagine, think broadly, collaborate, capture serendipity, and have the freedom to create [Innovation Ecosystem]

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• Curiosity needs to be coupled with the ability to critically evaluate data, accept input and be ready to adopt the change. Lack of imagination kills many a projects

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• Patience is a mandatory condition if innovation is to thrive. There is a need for the tenacity to overcome technical obstacles and to champion their bold new ideas in the face if disbelief

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• There is no one predictable path to successful innovation. Half of the great innovations in the world came from great insights, the other half happened by accident and none of them on a schedule

• [Roger McNamee – a longtime technology investor]

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• Innovation can be a messy and inefficient process; it is not one that can be managed through simple metrics

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• The innovation process is driven by the need to understand how something works or why it doesn’t, to grow revenue, reduce costs, or increase productivity; to solve a customer’s problem; or to keep healthy and save lives• [DNA of Invention]• [JUDY ESTERIN- “CLOSING THE

INNOVATION GAP”, McGraw Hill]17MMS -OIM Mumbai

Technology innovation and its industrial application first become strongly evident during the industrial revolution of the eighteen and nineteen centuries when individuals such as Robert Stephenson, James Watt, Humphery Davy and Michael Faraday, came to the fore and were celebrated for their contributions to both technology and the economy

- Christopher M Snowden, Rec. R. Soc., 2010, 64, S55-S63

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The pace of scientific innovation and its acceptance by the public and business community increased during the twentieth century.

The appreciation that science makes important contribution to society became especially evident with major breakthrough in medicine and health, such as Fleming’s discovery of Penicillin for treating bacterial infections, which drove the early growth of the pharmaceutical industry in the middle of the last century.

Progressively the process of discovery and the monetary or strategic value that may be created have been recognized by business and governments

- Christopher M Snowden, Rec. R. Soc., 2010, 64, S55-S63

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Serendipity

Serendipity has always played a crucial role but does not

strike uninitiated persons. Examples in the Chemical

Industry- LDPE, HDPE, Cellulose nitrate, Teflon, Viagra,

etc.

Serendipitous events have often changed the Course of

Science

It is possible to create an environment where serendipity

gets a chance to work

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Lord May, The Former President, Royal Society, London

Systematically organized research activities arguably began

in the mid-1800s, in the nascent German Chemical Industry.

The subsequent centuries saw steady growth.

World War- II vividly demonstrated the importance of

Science (sometimes in regrettable ways). The past 50 years

have seen more advances in scientific knowledge than in all

past human history, while the number of research workers

today likewise exceeds the total ever previously to have

lived. 21MMS -OIM Mumbai

It is the nature of basic “blue skies” research that its

fruits are unpredictable and largely unownable. It is a

classic “public good”. This is why most support for

basic research (roughly 80% in the U.K., with around

6% from industry and most of the rest from Charities)

comes – and always will come- from Governments.

The Science Base is the absolute bedrock of economic

performance.

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There are three reasons why governments

invest in their science base:

1. For the new knowledge thus produced

2. (More important) To buy a ticket in the wider club of

knowledge producers

3. (Most important) For the successive cadres of trained

young people, some of whom will cycle back into the

knowledge- producing process, while others carry its

products out into industry, business, public service,

etc.

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Researchers are in the main driven by curiosity

On the other hand, their patrons, these days primarily

governments on behalf of taxpayers, are driven by

economic practicalities. This causes tension.

Create institutional cultures in which the best young

people are free to express their creativity and set their

own agendas, not being entrained in hierarchies of

deference to their seniors, no matter how distinguished

these may be.

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Dilemma of an Innovator

Ideas may be considered revolutionary or pedestrian

Faces humiliation

Genius prefers homogeneity of individuals rather than

heterogeneity of groups. We in the universities have

the spiritual freedom to try new ideas

Small firms have therefore greater propensity to take

risks

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Good innovation requires you to have a broad mix of

individuals. These range from pioneering extroverts, who

are possibly even stormy and irrational, at one end of

spectrum, through solid, systematic team players in the

middle, to dogmatic, rigid, or even reactionary characters

at the other extreme.

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CEOs and Boards have become the major impediment

to sustaining innovation

More than innovation, budgets dictate behavior

It takes courage to view innovation as the enabler, not

the enemy, of earnings

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Seeking consensus for all breakthrough innovation

decisions is another deadly innovation disease; it wastes

valuable time and can dilute creative concepts. CEO can

protect an innovation culture, learn from failures rather

than punish or stigmatize then. Failure is an integral part

of the innovation process.

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Innovations require change and change requires

courage. Instilling a climate that recognizes the critical

need for innovations and encourages and rewards

innovative behavior requires a change in the mind set

of many CEO’s

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• A fertile relationship between Science and Engineering is required

• The case of Plastic LED (Serendipitous)

• The inspiration to study the semi conductive properties of molecules came from curiosity, but was rapidly paralleled by the desire to make something from it

-Dr. R. Friend, Physicist, University of Cambridge30MMS -OIM Mumbai

We should downplay the distinction between applied and ‘not yet applied’ science.

Whether our motive is curiosity, or whether there is a practical goal in sight, ‘problem solving’ is the activity that motivates us all.

The mindset is same, whether one is an engineer facing a novel design challenge, or an astronomer mapping the remote cosmos.

There is as much intellectual challenge in the applications as in the science itself

-M.J. Rees, Former President, The Royal Society, UK

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• Innovation is the electric charge that makes the world’s heart beat

• To predict the future of Technologies is more or less to predict the future of Economics

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Put Science and Innovation at the heart of

• a strategy for long-term Economic Growth

• Priority investment in excellent people

• Strengthen Government’s use of science

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Fruits of Science are required for:

• Vaccines against pandemics• Better food supplies• ‘Clean’ energy• More robust networks• Equitable policies to preserve ecosystem and climate

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• In-house R & D is essential even to benefit from the OI

• Interactions with Universities is very fruitful

Role of Open Innovation (OI)

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• No single action will reenergizes our innovation system. We will need a portfolio of interconnected, interdependent initiatives to generate new knowledge and technology and move that new knowledge into a competitive world marketplace

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• The Government of China has a 15 year plan for linking 60% of the country’s overall economic growth to scientific and technological innovations

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We as a nation will have to innovate to survive

We need to nurture best-minds and be elitist entirely

from brilliance point of view

Remember we cannot feed tomorrow’s population

with today's agriculture

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There is no innovation that is moreimportant for the world than thedevelopment of young minds

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